Success Story Panel: Amy Kumph

Moderator Alvina Ling (top L), illustrator
Amy Kumph (top R), author Pam Harris (below)

Amy Kumph earned a Bachelor of Science in interior design, a more practical path to her than an art degree, but she continued to creating murals and pottery before ultimately set her sights on illustrating. Amy lives on the East Coast, close to the sea, with her husband, three daughters and two funny little dogs. 

AMY'S FIRST BOOK is in progress right now, but she started thinking about illustrating a decade ago while raising her kids. She was reading a lot of incredible kids books that she absolutely loved and just kept thinking "I think I would like to do this, but there were a lot of people out there volleying for these positions and I felt like I wouldn't make it, and that created a little bit of fear. I won't lie to you, there was a little bit of will I ever even accomplish this goal? But I just kept going, and here I am."

Amy's favorite book as a kid

Amy's first in-person conference was the SCBWI New England Editor/Agent Day many years ago for which she wrote and illustrated a book dummy to present at different round tables over the course of the day. Amy says the positive feedback from those roundtable industry professionals was enough to keep her going for many years to come.

Until last year! When she won the SCBWI unagented illustrator portfolio show award. From that win Amy had two interviews, one with Little Brown Books, and one with Simon and Schuster, and Amy called both of those experiences "just fabulous".

But Simon and Schuster's Lauren Rille helped set Amy up with her agent, Andrea Morrison of Writers House, and in January of this year Amy found out she would be illustrating legendary Cynthia Rylant's next picture book (title to come) with Allyn Johnston of Beach Lane Books editing.

Advice Amy would give to those just starting out: 

• Give yourself time and space to be creative. 
• You be you, be true to who you are. 
• Think long and hard about what you want to actually draw or illustrate, because that passion will come through, and if you're not interested in what you're illustrating, that will be obvious.
• Have fun.
• Fear less.

Amy says she regrets not putting herself out there earlier, she lurked for years before joining or submitting to portfolio shows, and the first show she did finally enter she won! If you've worked really hard, if you've done the research, if you've done the reading, the next step is to start putting yourself out there.

from Amy's online portfolio

Editor's Panel on Hits and Evergreens: Allyn Johnston

Allyn Johnston's an editor everyone dreams of working with. In her 24

Editor Allyn Johnston

years of children's publishing, she's shepherded some of the most wonderful books into shelves. Her authors and illustrators include Mem Fox, Lois Ehlert, Marla Frazee, Cynthia Rylant, Avi, M.T. Anderson and more.

Her imprint at Simon & Schuster is called Beach Lane Books, where she is vice president and publisher. Andrea Welch is the senior editor there (and is also at this conference).

Lin Oliver introduced Allyn as "our resident grump." This, people, is fiction.

Most of her long career has been based in California. They publish about 25 books a year, mostly young picture books, but also do novels for older readers. They've bought 15 manuscripts from people who've heard them speak and sent manuscripts in that way--so conference success stories can happen.

When she considers a picture book, she asks, "Does this thing have the power to do the magic with the word and pictures and the voice and the performance an adult does when they're reading aloud to a young child?"

What makes an evergreen and what makes a hit? 

Most editors are looking for long relationships with authors and illustrators we work with. "We aren't making the decision to buy your one project."

She's done 27 books with Lois Ehlert. All 27 are still in print (some via Harcourt). "That to me is extremely moving and gratifying."

The math of whether a book is "successful" is complicated, she said. "If we spent zillions of dollars on a book, it could be on a bestseller list for a long time but still might not earn out."

But a book that gets on a state list and goes into reprints--suddenly you've sold 100,000 copies. "You want the earn out when you're doing our job." It's not so much about bestsellers. 

Editors do a lot of behind-the-scenes maneuvering to acquire manuscripts. Anticipating the objections of others is a key part of the job.

"The great Sid Fleischman used to say to writers, 'point to the problem,'" Allyn said. "If there's a weakness, make it a strength."

Mostly, though, it's essential for editors to love the books they acquire. It's a bummer, she said, when you acquire something you don't really love and you have to find an artists and talk about it at marketing.

What quality do you respond to in a book? 

Allyn told us the story of how she acquired ALL THE WORLD, the Caldecott-honor winning book by Liz Garton Scanlon and Marla Frazee. A the time, she was working with Marla on another project. It wasn't going well, but Marla had sorted things out and was on a roll when Allyn got an email from Liz Garton Scanlon, an unagented writer who'd heard Allyn speak at a conference.

"I read it because it's very brief. And I called her as soon as I was done. I hadn't shown it to one other person at the house. I said, this is stunning and we're going to buy it."

Allyn sent it to Marla Frazee who was working on something else. She told Marla to drop what she was doing and illustrate the book. Marla wasn't so sure we wanted to, but she did.

The manuscript felt universal, and timeless. It struck an emotional chord and a fabulous satisfying ending--all keys for Allyn.

"It had some clunker stanzas in that draft, but it was all the things I dream about in a picture book manuscript just sitting right there," she said.



 

The Real Deal About Picture Books with Allyn Johnston

A knockout first session with the VP and Publisher of Simon & Schuster's Beach Lane Books. Allyn spent the session talking only about the words in a picture book with a focus on great opening lines. She handmade a bazillion blank dummies which the audience borrowed. As a group we turned the 'pages' of the books that Allyn read aloud which helped us all experience the rhythm and pacing of each picture book.

Some of the titles Allyn read (she is a SUPERB storyteller!) included:
Mem Fox's HATTIE AND THE FOX, Debra Frasier's ON THE DAY YOU WERE BORN, and Laurie Keller's SCRAMBLED STATES OF AMERICA

Allyn stressed that all of the titles above were gifts to the adult reader, setting them up to be mesmerizing tale tellers for our target audience. She asked that everyone read READING MAGIC by Mem Fox
For Allyn, "Picture books are an extremely emotional art form. When they work – why they work, is because they make you feel something." She then quoted Mem Fox, "You want the audience's emotional temperature to be changed throughout the reading experience."

Allyn mentioned a great new interview with faboo Marla Frazee which you should all read.

--Posted by Jaime

Exclusive SCBWI TEAM BLOG Interview: Allyn Johnston

The latest of our SCBWI TEAM BLOG exclusive pre-conference interviews with Winter Conference keynotes and speakers is up on Jaime Temairik's blog.

Jaime interviewed the always awesome Allyn Johnston, Vice President & Publisher of Beach Lane Books, who will be offering three breakout sessions on THE REAL DEAL ABOUT PICTURE BOOKS.

Click here to read the interview with Allyn.

And be sure to tune in *RIGHT HERE* starting Friday, for exclusive live Winter Conference coverage by our crack team of bloggers, Jaime, Jolie, Lee, Suzanne and Alice!

Click here to register for the SCBWI Winter Conference in New York City where you can see Allyn Johnston in person.